The Resistance and the Struggle for National Liberation

1941 - 1946

Following the German invasions of Yugoslavia and the USSR, the Yugoslav people mobilized a large a partisan army to repel the occupying forces. The partisan resistance was organized and led by Josip Broz Tito and the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. Following their victory over the German occupiers, the people of Yugoslavia refused to re-establish the rule of monarchy under the exiled King Peter. The Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia was founded and Tito was elected president of the nation shortly thereafter.

It has been necessary to shed floods of precious national blood, it has been necessary that tens of thousands
of the nation's finest sons lay down their lives in the
course of two years' unequal struggle with the enemy,
that in the end the truth about the actual situation in
Yugoslavia might hew its way through to the world.
Never before perhaps has a small nation paid such a high
price to convince the world that the blood which has
been shed in Yugoslavia is its own blood…The struggles of our peoples and the brilliant successes which they
have achieved on the field of battle…have created all
the conditions necessary that our peoples may succeed in
realizing their aspiration-a free, truly democratic, fraternal, federal Yugoslavia.

—Josip Broz Tito

Josip Broz Tito (1892 -1980)
Tito organized and led the partisan resistance in Yugoslavia during World War II. He was elected Prime Minister of Yugoslavia in 1945 and in 1974 he was named President for life, a position he held until his death in 1980. (Full biography)

Tito and His People
A chronicle of the Yugoslav resistance, including a biographical sketch of Josip Broz Tito and information regarding the history of Yugoslavia through the eyes of American author Howard Fast. First published in 1944.

Writings from the People's Federal Republic of Yugoslavia(1946-1963)

Peace and Greece Ales Bebler (October 1948)Speech of Dr. Ales Bebler, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Acting Chief of the Delegation of the F.P.R. of Yugoslavia to the Third Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations. Delivered before the First Committee of the General Assembly on October 27, 1948.

The Praxis Group
A Marxist-humanist journal which stressed the significance of the early humanists writings of Marx and pleaded for a creative adaptation of Marxism in the context of Yugoslav self-management.

Gajo Petrović Archive One of the main theorists in the Praxis Group and long-time editor of the journal Praxis, Petrović was one of the leaders of the Yugoslav critique of Stalinist philosophical ideas after the early 1950s. His philosophical views evolved towards an interpretation of Marxism based on the philosophical works of the young Marx.

Anarchist Writings on Yugoslavia

Enver Hoxha on Tito
“After many patient efforts to bring the renegade Tito into line, when they were convinced he was incorrigible, Stalin, the Bolshevik Party and all the other genuine communist parties of the world unanimously condemned him.”

Maoist Critiques of Tito and
Yugoslavian Communism
“Tito specialized in being disappointed. His energy belongs to that side. The Moscow Declaration is the strength of our side. The Yugoslavia program checks the ambition of the proletariat and encourages the arrogance of the enemy.”

Kočo Racin (22 December 1908 - 13 June 1943) was a Macedonian poet who is considered to be the founder of modern Macedonian literature. He was also one of the leading Communists in the Republic of Macedonia in the period between the two world wars. In the second half of 1933 he was member of the Land Committee of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia for Macedonia. In the beginning of 1934 he was captured by the police and sentenced to prison. He was imprisoned until December 1935. During World War II, Racin joined the ranks of the National Liberation Army. He was killed on Lopushnik Mountain in 1943 by his comrades in arms, most probably by mistake.

Racin wrote his major work, "Beli mugri" ("White downs"), in 1939 and "Lenka" is a song from this collection.